As mass production has to be accompanied by mass consumption; mass consumption, in turn, implies a distribution of wealth -- not of existing wealth, but of wealth as it is currently produced -- to provide men with buying power equal to the amount of goods and services offered by the nation's economic machinery.-- Marriner Eccles

The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.-- Neil deGrasse Tyson/2015 (possibly earlier)

There is still a lot of thinking on the right that if big corporations are happy, they're going to take the money they're saving and reinvest it in American workers. In fact they bought back shares, a few gave out bonuses; there's no evidence whatsoever that they[sic] money's been massively poured back into the American worker.-- Marco Rubio (darling of the Right)/2018

03 March 2016

The Good. The Super. The Supreme. part the second

It's good to be alive.
It's Super Tuesday.
It's impossible for the Rabid Right to get it's way with the Supreme court.

Regular reader may recall the proposition that motive and incentive always trump (hehe) data when they are in conflict. With the passing of Scalia, the RR immediately looked at the data, their control of the House and Senate, and pronounced that there would be no Obama replacement. They intended to get a Super Scalia, i.e. more rabidly right, next year.

My, how bad was that assessment? Earlier today I saw a headline that Obama is to meet today with Republicans to discuss appointment. At the time of the passing, I allowed (although not until now in print) McConnell was out of his mind.

Here's the situation. If the RR double down on the election, what's the likely outcome? We won't know until tomorrow morning, but the candidate will be either Trump, Rubio, or Cruz. None can win the election, whether against Sanders or Clinton. A bold statement, but Trump is a wacko billionaire, and the other two are paid for by wacko billionaires. Not only is the RR certain to not win the White House, if it pushes its KKK agenda, it will lose both House and Senate; the latter with greater certainty.

So, McConnell et al face a simple wager: get a "moderate", less than Super Scalia, now or risk another Ginsberg in a year. Such a deal?

[part 2, 3 March]
As any Ph.D. quant or desperate stockmarket plunger knows, odds on an outcome change as the event's time approaches. In the case of sports events, the bookies adjust odds to keep the amount of moolah going to each outcome about equal. The same might be said of political events. If events proceed as at present, Trump becomes more unstoppable toward the nomination. As that happens, the RR has to gauge whether they can get a Trump White House, and if so whether he'd nominate a Super Scalia. Both are highly unlikely.

Me: He has a reputation as a straight shooter, but he lies. When PolitiFact was choosing its "lie of the year," it found that all its real contenders were Trump statements -- so it collectively awarded his many campaign misstatements the "lie of the year" award. And in backing him, you're pretty much guaranteeing a Hillary Clinton presidency. Indeed, because of Trump, the betting markets are now predicting a Democratic Senate as well.

Voter: Come on! Trump proved all of you pundits wrong again and again, and he'll do so again. And even those betting markets you like to cite -- they show Trump with at least a one-in-four chance of being our next president, and that's while other Republicans are trying to rip him apart. Just wait until the party rallies around Trump.
[my emphasis]

Naming her would escalate political pressure on Republican Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who spoke fondly of Kelly in 2013 before the Senate voted 96-0 to confirm her for the Court of Appeals.

Not game, set, match. Too soon, but it's political waterboarding at its best.